Strategies for Growing and Enhancing University-Level Japanese Programs (PDF)

Fumie Kato is Associate Professor of Japanese at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA. Her expertise lies in applied linguistics, specifically foreign language acquisition, learning strategies, student motivation and PBLL (Project-Based Language Learning). She earned a PhD in applied linguistics at the University of Sydney in 2001. She moved to Charlotte as an assistant professor in 2004. She has received five prestigious awards: International Education Faculty Award; finalist, Bank of America Award for Teaching Excellence; Bonnie Cone Early-Career Professorship in Teaching award; AATJ's (American Association of Teachers of Japanese) 2016 Teacher Award; Foreign Minister's Commendations in Honor of the 70th Anniversary of the End of the War with the United States of America, as well as many competitive grants. Dr. Kato's publications include Improving Student Motivation toward Japanese Learning (2010), written in English and Japanese from Gakujutsu Shuppansha in Japan, and more than 15 peer-reviewed articles in journals including Language Teaching Research and Foreign Language Annals. She has developed approximately ten courses and redesigned seven others for the Japanese Program at UNC Charlotte, which offers a translation certificate, graduate translation certificate, business certificate and a Japanese BA Honors degree.